Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Experience: The Great Professor

I tell her to always wear a helmet. No matter what.

"Nothing bad will happen Mom!"


Last night Experience spoke to her louder than a mothers nagging tongue.

"I think from now on I need to wear my helmet."

Instead of saying "I told you so!" I let Experience do what it does. It teaches in perfect timing. It tills the soil of our hearts to bring us to a point where our eyes and ears are churned up enough to receive the seed it plants. Hopefully this one will grow for her.


I gave her a hug and said "Lets take pictures!" I laughed as I was clicking away. She laughed too, but only because my laughter is contagious. "Mom! I just got hit by a car, and your laughing!" I looked at these pictures and what I saw was a broken neck, broken legs and a child lying paralyzed in a hospital room. I saw me standing over her casket threatening to kill her a second time by drowning her in my tears. How could I not laugh with joy at the reality right in front of me.

"Sometimes" I said, "when you realize how alive you are, you have to laugh at death." She laughed even harder.



These skinned up knees remind me how important it is to take a risk and live from the heart. Life is short.

Saturday, April 25, 2009

Life....It Still Goes On.



I want you to know that although this day marks 27 years since you have passed, not a day goes by that I don't think of you. There has been much that has happened since I last saw you. It would take me 27 years to tell you everything. I hope it's true what they say about passing on. You know, that you guys can see us here. But if I could pick and choose what you could see, I would only want you to see the good stuff I guess. Stuff like I am riding my bike again and even racing. I would want you to see that I think of you every time I ride, and on particularly bad days I imagine that you are with me, and you help me figure things out. There have been times when I needed you to be there like only a brother could be for his little sister. I wonder if you know how much I miss you.

Sometimes I catch glimpses of you in my son. He is funny and easy going like you, and he has that same mop of unruly hair atop his head. He even walks like you.

Danny contacted me on FaceBook. I think about all your friends this time of year. I had terrible crushes on your friends. When you would have them sleep over I would sneak downstairs and kiss their faces. I felt compelled to try and look all of them up and see how they turned out, but I don't have the time. I have kids of my own and I am in school full time.

Be warned that if I get my homework done today I may come and visit your grave. Every time I go there, this vision of myself flashes in my mind of me throwing myself on the ground and just sobbing until the tears penetrate the six feet of dirt that covers you. Instead I just stand there and look at your picture on your headstone, and a vague awareness that you aren't even there prevents me from doing so. Then I glance at Mom and Matt's headstones, and my heart thumps hollow in my chest. If you see them could you tell them I hope someday we can work things out?

I have to run now. I have spin class this morning,homework, and something to look forward to for tomorrow to help me get through this day. It still feels like it was just yesterday that you died. But it's been 27 years. And life...It still goes on.

I love you

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Doomed

So I asked a few people about what category to race this past Sunday at the Yankee TT. Most said Sport Women on my geared bike. But I don't want to ride my geared bike. Like, not even a little. Ever. I want to ride my SS even if it means losing. People couldn’t understand why I would want to ride in a race I surely wouldn't win. It is a little like entering into a doomed relationship. "Why would you do that to yourself?” Eric said. "Ride your geared bike and kick ass in Women Sport!"

But I talked to one who understood my heart. He’s the one I listened to. He couldn’t have been more right if he were God himself. "SS Beginner/Sport," he said.

So I did.

I have found true love.
I’d be stupid to go back now. Thanks Puppy.

To answer the question as to why I have set myself up for failure when I could excell in another class? I am learning it isn't always about winning, although I love that taste as well. It's about how I am going to ride from beginning to end, and because...


I am a Bad Ass ;)

Thursday, April 16, 2009

As Birch Trees DO



It was September 2, 2002, Labor Day Weekend. I was going through a lot at that time in my life. I had just been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in February. I also happened to be “saved” the day before. I had a profound spiritual awakening with this experience, so I was hungry and desperate for God. I started the day on my knees, empty handed, asking for something to fill them with so I could give it back to him. I just remember wanting to give back to God, as if my every movement and my very life depended on it.

On this particular morning I went to the North Club to attend a support group I was a member of. I sat in the lobby to have a cup of coffee and a cigarette. I looked up and saw Bear. I had never met him before, but his reputation preceded him. He’s what we would commonly refer to as an “Old Timer” around the club. I am not sure if he was actually this tall, but he seemed like he was seven feet or better. His presence was huge. He wore dark blue bib overalls with a white t-shirt, exposing his full sleeve tattooed arms. He walked on thin legs with a cane, and his belly always arrived at his destination before he did. A ball cap covered his balding head and a goat-tee failed to cover the pox marks in his cheeks. Rumor had it that he was just out of the hospital for a heart attack or some other life threatening ailment, of which I am not sure. He sat next to me and lit a cigarette. The smoke swirled about his head like a halo. This got me thinking about angels, which got me thinking about God again, which got me wondering what I might do for my part in that relationship.
As Bear and I chit chatted and made small talk, our conversation kept getting interrupted by this phrase in my head, “When you visit them in prison, you have visited me.” I got up from the table and announced that I was going to go visit my step brother, whom I had just found out about. He had been in prison at Oaks Correctional Facility since he was 16. I asked Bear if he knew how to get there. “I used to live in the area”, he said. I’m still not sure if he meant freely or incarcerated. I hesitated to ask him if he wanted to ride along. He was obviously in ill health and frankly I was afraid he might die on the drive up. It was a two hour drive. That’s a long time in a car with an old dying biker. “Trust Me”, kept running through my head, so against my better judgment I asked him if he would like to join me. I’ve never seen a crippled up person hobble so fast.

Once we were on the road, Bear began to talk about nature, and how he spent some time just living off the land wandering around in the wilderness. The more he talked the more I was in awe of what he was saying. It was coming out more like a song than mere words, and I knew I had to right this stuff down right then so I wouldn’t forget it. It just so happened that I had a note book in my car for such occasions, but Bear couldn’t drive, because apparently the guy was legally blind. I asked him to man the steering wheel while I operated the gas pedal and brakes. He talked and steered while I wrote, with my foot on the gas. We rode for the better part of the two hour trip like that. So there we were floating down the highway in my 1992 Caprice Classic, him practically singing to me and me hanging on his every word. Looking back now I would say this was probably my first true experiences at partnership with another human being.

I really didn’t talk much the whole time, so he caught me off guard when he asked if I had ever noticed what the Birch trees do. I had spent way too much of my adult life drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes to know anything about Birch Trees, so I said no. He went on to explain to me that you can always tell when a storm is coming by the Birch leaves. It’s in their nature to turn their leaves over, forming a cup, to catch the rain.

Bear has long since past. I never saw him again after that day. I’ve quit smoking, but I still have too much blood in my caffeine stream. We drove 2 hours that day and I never got to see my step brother. I didn’t know you had to pre-register to visit. Some might think it was a wasted trip, but I learned a valuable lesson. I still think about the simple nature of the Birch Tree, and it causes me to wonder about my own nature in this relationship to God Almighty. I am changing a bit. Now when I see a storm approaching in life, and I cover my head, I am quicker to turn my palms heavenward to catch the life that cascades downward, disguised as rain, in my hands. When I do this, He always gives me something to give back to Him. I am learning that God doesn’t waste a thing, not even a 2 hour trip with dashed expectations. I am learning that the lessons in these very things are priceless. I am learning to trust. I am learning to do as the Birch Trees do.

My leaves are full at present.

Friday, April 3, 2009

An Affair to Remember

Do you remember when you were a kid on the beach building sand castles? I would always get lost in what I was doing and wind up with a bathing suit packed with sand. This same phenomenon happens when I am on my bike only it's not the bathing suit that gets packed. It's the chain. So I spent the evening down at TMI relieving Jack of the grit in his suit and shining up the hub.

It should be noted that I know nothing about working on bikes. I can fix and change a flat. Wow. It should also be noted that I get a bit tense when others are working on my bike. I may have mentioned before it's comparable to getting a pelvic exam. Far to much intimacy with a stranger. So the guys down at the shop know I get cranked when something is wrong with my bike. They also know I don't trust them when they are trying to help me. I don't even try to hide this fact. They head for the bomb shelter when I show up with my lover in tow. I can be a bit emasculating, I guess. I don't mean to be. I'm just neurotic about my bike. So, if you are reading this and you have ever in the past, or in the future, tried to help me with my bike, I am asking you to forgive me across the board on this issue right now.

It could get ugly.

More than one individual has said to me while I am in a state of perceived "Bike Crisis" that it's not that big of a deal, and it is only a bike in the grand scheme of things. If you should ever say this to me, I will mostly likely nod in agreement and try to muster up a smile, all while visualizing removing everyone one of your toe nails with rusty needle nose pliers, and forcing you to soak your feet in lemon juice. Sounds like torture doesn't it? Well, the threat of not being able to ride my bike is absolutely torture for me too, unless of course it is raining. In fact, it was raining this morning when I got up. That got me thinking of long weekends snuggled up with many books in a cabin in some remote location. I can always find something else to do if it rains. But if it's a physical issue with me, or a mechanical issue with the bike, my panties are going to be in a bunch. You'll just have to be the bigger person.

I knew the chain was gritty, but I was primarily concerned that there may be sand in my "not really a bracket" bottom bracket. I really didn't want to take everything apart, so Eric convinced me to just slip the chain off and spin the crank arms. Everything sounded okay so after getting the chain and hub as clean as I could, I put the wheel back on. I have an Eccentric Hub. It is named this for a reason. It takes finesse that my inexperienced hands lack.


When I first put the wheel back on, the brake pads were so far off, it looked like I put the wrong wheel on the bike. Steve came over to see what I was doing. He said all we needed to do was adjust the brakes. Normally I would have agreed, but the adjustment was far to significant and my mind was obsessing on why there was such a dramatic change. He went to grab some tools to start in on the brakes, but I stopped him. Sometimes my mind can't let go of what it can't explain. This isn't always a good thing for the people in my life. I took the bike off the stand and flipped it over. I was able to get it so nestled in the drops, and the pads so lined up that the wheel wouldn't spin. I was baffled again but more willing to accept this minor adjustment over the previous gross difference. I paid careful attention while he adjusted the brakes this time. Not that I haven't paid close attention the 5,000 other times I was shown on my geared bike, but it's different with Jack. This is a bike that I want to know.

When I got him home last night I brought him inside. The thought crossed my mind that this is probably something that another individual would find unacceptable. I have not one, but two bikes in my living room. My living room is small. I let out a sigh of relief that I am single. I oiled the chain and spun the crank arms. Smooth as silk.
In spin class this morning I was acutely aware of the mortician makeup and breast implants as compared to my lack of femininity, evidenced by the bruises and chain grease ground into my nails and skin.
As I shined the hub I felt good about the decision I made earlier in the day to just get to know myself and the bike this summer. Single but unavailable. What a concept. Jack was happy to have the sand removed from his suit; I'll do whatever it takes to make him happy.

It's going to be an awesome summer!